Status of Unfinished Business for PST:EE?

Comments

As it's been over two months since my last message to him, I've reached out to Qwinn again to see if he's interested in giving a hand in updating the olds mods to EE. No response yet, but I'll keep you guys posted if he replies one way or the other.

Getting Planescape: EE was just a way to get planescape easily installable and with no (at least, with the trust of no) bugs and some updates. They released a dev diary where they said that Unfinished bussiness was never meant to be in all components inside the game.

Why would you be interested in such a mod, and actually buy EE and not the original version? Asking random people on internet will not do anything.

Getting Planescape: EE was just a way to get planescape easily installable and with no (at least, with the trust of no) bugs and some updates. They released a dev diary where they said that Unfinished bussiness was never meant to be in all components inside the game.

Why would you be interested in such a mod, and actually buy EE and not the original version? Asking random people on internet will not do anything.

There are multiple reasons people are interested in the mod.

I have completed the original Planescape: Torment twice - once with the mod, and once without - and I have to say that the experience playing it with the mod felt richer and more complete. There are multiple interesting conversations, some small sidequests, extended plot threads that in the original game had potential but no development and more fleshed-out scenarios and areas. All the improvements felt organic and part of the gameplay (the only exception being "Restore Morte Mortuary Moments" which honestly isn't needed and detracts from the strong script at the beginning - and handily the mod installer lets you leave that out if you want).

The fact that Beamdog didn't include Unfinished Business as default (if optional) content in EE is, in my eyes, a mistake, and is the reason I'm still holding off playing PST:EE even though I've already bought it.

However, since the EE remasters are overall cleaner and will run better on my system, the ideal scenario would see Unfinished Business ported over to EE.

He's not asking random people either - this forum is for mods for Planescape Torment: Enhanced Edition. If there's any place to find modders that can make the mod happen, it's likey here.

At first glance it looks like nothing's been done there since it was set up.

Badungu and BROJ was working on the mod to some extent but constantly asking about it probably won't make them complete it any faster. That said, I'm hoping the info that Qwinn likely isn't working on it serves as an incentive for others to put more effort into doing it themselves.

As SoulReaver mentioned, here is the GitHub page: https://github.com/badungu/PST-UB I'm guessing you saw that, but on that page he said "If you're willing to contribute, please contact me and I will add you to the project." He's on the forums, so you could private message him here. I wasn't sure how to use github to contact him.

@badungu Just drawing your attention to this in case @Andrei132 isn't sure how to contact you.

I wish I were able to help, but I don't know a single thing about modding, coding, etc.

Since previous attempts (e.g. by winterheart or badungu) to make PS:T Unfinished Business available to PSTEE appear to be discontinued or on hold, I have decided to make an attempt myself.

I'm still in an early stage, looking into Qwinn's original code (PST-UB v4.12) and doing some basic cleanup.

My goal is to1. Update WeiDU code to current standards2. Add support for PSTEE3. Retain compatibility with classic PST4. And possibly add a new feature or two myself

The majority of content shouldn't require too much effort to be ported to PSTEE (mostly dialog stuff and scripting). Other parts, such as the bestiary or journal related code, probably requires a lot of rewriting.

A couple of features are implemented by patching the game executable, which isn't feasible for the EE version. However, there is still hope that Beamdog will implement some of them in future game patches.

Yes, it is. The item is part of the optional component "Expanded Deionarra's Truth Mod".

Btw, it looks like one exe hack from the original mod can already be implemented in PST:EE just by updating some Lua scripts.It'll allow the game to switch bestiary images based on global variables. It is used by the mod to change the image of the TO from a shadowy figure to a glowing creature at a certain point in the plot.

Yes, it is. The item is part of the optional component "Expanded Deionarra's Truth Mod".

Btw, it looks like one exe hack from the original mod can already be implemented in PST:EE just by updating some Lua scripts.It'll allow the game to switch bestiary images based on global variables. It is used by the mod to change the image of the TO from a shadowy figure to a glowing creature at a certain point in the plot.

I only hope you won't abandon this like the people before you, lack of UB is the only thing preventing me from buying PSTEE.

Most stuff is trivial to convert from a technical perspective. It's just a time-consuming process.

That is good to hear, although you said in an earlier post that some things are not doable due to being done by hex editing the exe which obviously isn't feasibly possible with EE due to offsets being changed and whatnot I assume, which components are those exactly that relied on modifying the exe? I know Banter Accelerator was one of them but that one thankfully doesn't need modifying the exe in PSTEE anymore since it can be done by a lua mod from what I know.

Most stuff is trivial to convert from a technical perspective. It's just a time-consuming process.

That is good to hear, although you said in an earlier post that some things are not doable due to being done by hex editing the exe which obviously isn't feasibly possible with EE due to offsets being changed and whatnot I assume, which components are those exactly that relied on modifying the exe? I know Banter Accelerator was one of them but that one thankfully doesn't need modifying the exe in PSTEE anymore since it can be done by a lua mod from what I know.

Banter Accelerator was part of the original PST Tweaks mod. This feature has been unhardcoded for all EE games already, including PST:EE. There is a mod for it available.

Only very few features can't be ported yet. At present it is not possible to trigger character-specific voiced feedback when attempting to open locked doors or containers. There is also no personalized message when copying spell scrolls into the spellbook. Both options are part of the "Restored Party Comments and Banters" component. The mod will restore a standard sound effect for the "Copy Spell" action though, so that there is at least some kind of audible feedback. Since PST:EE is still actively maintained by Beamdog, there is a good chance that both features will be added by a future game patch.

Another original exe hack can already be ported to PST:EE (the bestiary improvements mentioned in a previous comment).

The remaining 98 percent of the mod can already be made available for PST:EE without too much effort.

I could've sworn the banter component was in the UB, but now that you're saying it I guess I misremembered due to the "party comments and banters" component. Are only the personalized spellbook, scroll and locked door/containers voices from it not possible to do for EE, or is the entire component not doable? Because lacking the extra banters and the character music themes would be quite a major loss and I really hope that isn't the case. I guess you could forward suggestion to Beamdog yourself about those sound clips seeing as you're a very reputable modder and they're more likely to take hint from you.